History of Aiguèze

Nowadays visitors experience Aiguèze as a peaceful, friendly village with its 200 inhabitants. So it is hard to imagine it’s violent war torn past. In its splendeur days, the population counted some 1000 inhabitants and 500 men at arms. During the 100 year war, around 1382, the population was reduced to only 9 living souls! All the houses where razed to the first floor, which explains the uniqueness of medival ground floors with renaissance upper fronts.

Charles Martel founded around 732 the first stones of a fortress, after the battle of Poitiers, on the heights of a basin of rich water,«Aigo» in the occitaine language, where the village gets it name from.

The Sarrasine tower is one of the oldest monuments in Aiguèze, built to defend the frequent attacks from the arabo-berber tribes, « the Sarrasins », since the XI century.

In the 60`s, the young family of the Ventajols had the great idea to reopen the vaults of the Sarrasine, which served in ancient times as a stables for noble’s horses. «L’Auberge Sarrasine», the restaurant which the family set up had a high reputation and was recommended all the way to Lyon!